


Cigarette Stealing Ways

by a_novel_idea



Series: all four of them [1]
Category: Dirk Gently's Holistic Detective Agency (TV 2016)
Genre: Alternate Universe - College/University, Drinking, F/M, Partying
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-11-13
Updated: 2017-11-13
Packaged: 2019-02-01 20:18:12
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,836
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12712227
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/a_novel_idea/pseuds/a_novel_idea
Summary: Amanda drags Farah to a party, runs into her ex, and makes friends with a group of punks.





	Cigarette Stealing Ways

**Author's Note:**

> I seriously need more Dirk Gently fic, but especially Amanda/Martin or Amanda/Rowdy 3, so I guess I'm just going to have to do it myself.

“I hate you,” Farah calls from her bedroom.

“No, you don’t,” Amanda sing-songs from the bathroom.

“I hate parties.”

“We both just aced our midterms, we need a break, and it’s open bar. You want to pay for your own alcohol?”

“No,” Farah sulks.

“Then get dressed,” Amanda says, stepping into Farah’s room. “What do you think?”

Farah looks up from where she has her face smashed in her pillow to look the younger girl over. Amanda is wearing her usual scuffed up black boots, a sleeveless black BABYMETAL shirt with the sides torn open tucked into a pair of high waisted hot pants, and a maroon bralette; she’s smudged her eyelids with black glitter and put in her favorite nose ring.

“You look like a kickass punk princess, like always,” Farah says.

“Thank you,” Amanda says, folding in half in an awful curtsy. “What are you wearing?”

“Clothes,” Farah says drily.

Amanda rolls her eyes, and goes to Farah’s closet, pushing aside the respectable clothes she owns and uncovering the single party outfit she’d bought only at Amanda’s insistence. The younger flings the black skin tight jeans and gold tank at her roommate.

“I can’t wear a bra with this,” Farah huffs.

“That’s half the fun.”

“It’s October.”

“I have pasties.”

“It’s cold.”

“You always get hot when you drink.”

“Amanda,” Farah groans.

“We can spend the next half hour arguing - and you know I’m going to win - or you can get up, get changed, and I’ll do your eyeliner.”

“Ugh,” Farah says, rolling off the bed.

***

Amanda and Farah catch a ride across campus to the Gamma Nu Epsilon house with their neighbor Tina. Tina’s cool, though obviously more interested in partying and hooking up than anything classes have to offer. She owns a shitty pickup truck that barely fits the three of them, but they make it work.

It’s going on ten and the party is already in full swing when the three of them arrive. Amanda slides out of the truck, the cool air hitting her bare skin, making a trail of goosebumps ripple across her arms and legs. She and Tina head for the front door, open to let the music spill out, and Farah follows sedately behind; it’ll take the Criminal Justice student a few drinks to loosen up properly.

Amanda revels in the carelessness that is a frat house party. She’s been so strung up about midterms the last month, she hasn’t had time to breathe, never mind think properly. She hasn’t gone out in ages, and she fully plans on making up for that tonight. She abandons Tina, already shoving her way into the crowd in front of the DJ, and heads to the kitchen. She pours two beer and heads back to the front door to find Farah.

The black woman has posted herself in a corner, arms crossed over her chest. Amanda rolls her eyes.

“Here,” she says, pushing the stereotypical red Solo cup into Farrah’s hands. “Try to have some fun?”

“You know I hate parties,” Farah whines.

“But you love me,” Amanda says. “And, oh my god, look, it’s my brother and his new crazy roommate.”

Farah turns to look, almost always interested in Amanda’s brother, despite her protests otherwise.

“Go over there,” Amanda says, pushing Farah away from the wall. “He likes you, too. Christ.”

“I’ll just go say hello,” Farah concedes, moving around the edge of the room to avoid most of the crowd.

Amanda rolls her eyes for the nth time that night, downs what’s left of her beer, and throws herself into the crowd to lose herself. And maybe find Tina.

***

Amanda doesn’t know how long she dances in the crowd - fifteen minutes, an hour, it all feels the same - but when she pushes her way out she heads straight for the kitchen, sights set on another beer. She pours her own from the keg, turns around, spots the front door opening, and then spots who’s pushing their way into the house.

“Shit,” she curses, moving out of sight of the door.

She downs her second beer, drops the cup on the floor, and looks for a possible escape route. The front room is a no go, she doesn’t know where Farah and her brother and her brother’s new weird roommate have gotten off to, and she doesn’t see anyone she knows well enough to hide behind. She notices the back door open, smells the cigarette smoke, and her feet move without her deciding a direction.

The night time air is frigid against her skin after spending however long pressed together with other bodies, but it’s also refreshing in the same way dumping cold water over your head is. There’s only one group lingering outside, willing to brave the cold for a hit, and she heads towards them, pulling the door closed behind her. There are three of them, probably older than she is, and definitely taller, though that’s not difficult. One of them, the one with shoulder length black hair and a circle tattooed around one eye, nods in her direction, alerting the other two to her presence.

The other two turn, one a tall black man with a beanie pulled down around his ears and a thick jacket zipped up to his chin, the other has a white mohawk, a dark beard that’s going grey around his mouth, and thick black glasses. She doesn’t let their attention deter her, heading right for their group.

“Hi,” she says. “I’ll give you ten bucks for a cigarette and to let me hide behind you guys for a while.”

The one with glasses blinks at her. “You okay?” he asks, a southern drawls marring his words.

“It’s a long story,” she says. “Deal?”

“No deal,” he says, and Amanda is about ready to argue when he holds a pack of cigarettes and a lighter out to her. “Ain’t no need to pay us to stand here lookin’ threatenin’. We do that anyway.”

“You guys are life savers,” she says, taking the pack and sliding around them to put her back against the side of the house. “I’m Amanda.”

“Martin,” says the one that handed her the cigarettes. “That’s Cross,” the one with the hair and the tattoo, “and that’s Gripps,” the one in the beanie and the jacket.

Amanda lights a cigarette and hands the pack back to Martin. He turns so his shoulder is leaned up against the house as well, but he isn’t close enough to make Amanda feel threatened. Cross and Gripps move to complete the circle.

“Who you hiding from?” Cross asks.

“Exboyfriend,” she says. “He’s a piece of shit that makes me feel like a piece of shit and he always either tries to get back together or start a fight and I’m so not here for that right now.”

“Anybody we’d know?”

“Probably not. He goes to City University.”

“Only one person that could be, boys,” Martin drawls, lighting another smoke. “Hugo Friedkin.”

“Uh, yeah,” Amanda says. “How do you know him?”

“Oh, he ain’t a friend of ours,” Martin assures her. “But you’re right; he likes to start shit. He’s made the mistake of tryin’ to take on the four a us before.”

“There are three of you,” Amanda says automatically.

“Vogel’s dancing inside,” Gripps says. “He’s the reason we came.”

“Okay,” Amanda smiles, “four then.”

Silence reigns for a moment, Amanda letting the nicotine calm her down, and when she looks back up she catches Gripps studying her.

“What?” she asks.

“You were in my Government class,” he says.

“I was?”

“Yeah. You and Professor Riggins argued a lot.”

Amanda scoffs. “I fucking hate Riggins. Never knows what he’s talking about. Wants to spout on and on about how the government is for the people - which is shit, by the way - and when you argue with him, he kicks you out of class.”

“How many times you get kicked out?” Martin asks.

“Every damn day,” Amanda says proudly.

The back door opens, the noise from the party pouring out, and Amanda peeks around Martin’s shoulder to see who’s come out into the cold.

“Motherfucker,” she spits.

“It’s Friedkin,” Cross says, so Martin doesn’t have to turn around.

“I swear to god, I should kill him and bury him in a shallow grave just so I can stop looking over my fucking shoulder,” Amanda hisses.

“He’s coming this way,” Cross mumbles.

At this, Martin does turn, unwilling to let someone with Friedkin’s history approach him from behind. Amanda notices that he does his best to keep her out of Friedkin’s sight, but luck is not in their favor.

“Amanda,” Friedkin says, “I’ve been looking for you.”

“Yeah, I bet you have,” she mutters, then louder, “What do you want?”

“I thought we could catch up. It’s been a while.”

“Oh, go fuck yourself, Hugo,” she says.

He takes a step in her direction, mouth turned down in a scowl, but Amanda’s view is blocked when Martin takes a step in front of her.

“Evenin’, Hugo. The fuck you want?” he asks.

“I’m talking to Amanda, not you,” Friedkin says.

“Yeah, but that’s the problem,” Martin says, blowing smoke in the other man’s direction. “See, we done told you what’d happen if you tried to mess with us again. We ain’t been lookin’ for a fight, but we’d be happy to oblige.”

“I’m talking to Amanda,” Friedkin says a little more slowly, as if Martin didn’t understand him the first time.

“Therein lies the problem,” Martin says. “Amanda’s one of us now. So messin’ with her is like messin’ with the rest of us, ain’t that right, boys?”

Gripps and Cross both let out a howl. Amanda can’t see Martin’s face, but she can read the lines of tension in his back, and she’s sure that his face is just as fierce as his posture.

Friedkin’s lip curls, and he says, “I’ll catch up to you later, Amanda.”

Before she can reply that she’d rather pull her own teeth, Martin says,

“That a threat, boy?”

Friedkin doesn’t say anything, but he does turn to go. Once he’s back in the house, Amanda sticks her hand in Martin’s jacket pocket and steals his pack of cigarettes. He turns to look at her, one eyebrow raised.

“Don’t look at me like that,” she says, clicking the lighter to life. “You just adopted me. You’re stuck with me and my cigarette stealing ways.”

Martin’s face breaks into a grin, something feral and not at all nice, and Amanda responds in kind.

“I think we’ll get along just fine, baby girl.”

Amanda chokes around the cigarette between her lips.

“Fuck no,” she says. “That’s what Friedkin used to call me.”

“Won’t do it again,” Martin promises, grimace marring his face.

“Drummer,” Gripps says.

“What?” Amanda asks.

“Every time Riggins kicked you out he said you made his head hurt like a bunch of people were playing drums in his skull.”

“Drummer girl,” Martin says, “I like it.”

Amanda laughs.


End file.
